K.C. Wahe

A half sister of mine found this old picture of my biological mom.

WOW.

This is Rachel.

Rachel and I met almost two years ago. Rachel is 89 years old and loves Jesus and loves teaching God’s Word to children.

Rachel was recruited two years ago to be our VBS story teller. In 2007 and 2008 Rachel loved being the story teller. Rachel was a modern day Ms. Mears. She was always available when it came to kids stuff. I even remember Rachel serving at one of our Trunk Or Treat events. She parked her mini-van in our church parking lot, dressed in a costume,  and was ready to pass out candy to the neighborhood kids.

One of her dreams was to network with local Elementary Schools to run a kids club after school to offer a place where kids could learn what it means to follow Jesus. At a school near our church, she actually was able to get on campus and use a classroom to do her kids club. I remember her telling me on one occasion that this was one of the ways we could reach more kids for Christ.

She was right.

Earlier this year Rachel joined our church. She is loved by all and is very much a part of our faith community. Rachel is almost 90 years old and is currently in a nursing home. The doctors have given her only a few days to live.

Every time I’ve visited Rachel, she was always ready for me to pray with her. She’d muster as much strength as she could and would hold my hand until I was done praying and she’d go back to sleep. Last Sunday some folks from church brought Palm Sunday worship to Rachel. We sang together at Rachel’s bedside and gave Rachel communion.

Please pray for Rachel and her family.

When I asked Rachel what her favorite Bible verse was last week, she whispered this verse to me.

I wanted to cry and I pray that I myself would grow to love God’s Word as much as Rachel does.

Around 5:OOam this morning Rachel went home to be with the Lord.

Thanks for loving us like Jesus Ms. Rachel.

ht: churchonthemove

I joined High Calling Blogs today, a blogging faith community composed of followers of Jesus seeking to be faithful to God’s calling to sharing God’s love in the blogosphere.

This is in essence will keep me accountable to being a faithful blogger. Will it work? I certainly hope as I know there will be a couple of more readers who might show up. I also know this will continue my desire in my last post to being faithful in my writing. Thanks for granting me “permission to enter” high calling blogging big whigs!

Haven’t had much time to blog. I had someone play with the sound system at church and record a tiny little audio clip of my newly refretted guitar. geet08.mp3

I’m feeling spent today. The year is coming to an end quickly. Kids are growing up way to fast and I can’t seem to get past the idea that I’m not getting any younger. I took a drive through Hollywood today for simply one reason. To retrieve my guitar from a cool old guy named Art Valdez. Art is a professional flamenco guitarist. Art also makes guitars and refrets guitars.

The guitar I dropped off was a gift given to me almost 15 years ago by a church I love dearly. I remember the day when one of my old pastor friends handed it to me as a going away present. It was one of the neatest gifts I had ever received and I’ve put it to good use in my ministry as a youth pastor and now a pastor. After a bunch of years of playing, It needed to be refretted, and a good friend of mine suggested Valdez Guitars.

Now this guitar has taken a beating. It’s been played by kids in youth groups I’ve served. It’s been dropped and the wood has been chipped. I’ve played every youth group song and VBS song you can think of and I can’t count how many times I’ve broken a string. I’ve taken it to Mexico and back. It’s been rained on.  It’s been to the beach. It’s been to camp with kids. It’s even been to the east coast where it toured a few churches where I made some cash on the side by helping lead worship while getting through seminary. It’s even been stolen and brought back by a homeless dude.

Now why not spend the money I spent fixing this guitar and investing it into a new guitar? I thought about that today. I’ve even had a member of my church give me a really nice Martin to lead worship with which I love, but there is nothing like my beaten up takamine. The sound of the guitar now with the refret job? Let’s just say that it sounds better than ever.

When I feel spent and tired, something I do is retreat to my guitar. I can play and sing songs to God. I can worship him with my whole heart. I can even help lead the people of God into worship with the hopes that when we walk away from worshiping the Lord that we’re restored to go back out and serve God. My guitar is simply my paint brush and my canvass.

Thank you God for every good and perfect gift!

I took this picture yesterday of the church. The trim and fascia work are almost finished. We hope to color stucco sometime next week. If you’ve been to the church over the last year, you might remember that there was a trailer to the left of the building. The last task is to put in new landscaping completely around the church. The last task will be to pave the parking lot. Can I borrow a parking lot from someone?

Another view…

Job Complete…

Stucco is on. Now for the landscaping. Goal? By Christmas Eve. Lord willing.

The Cross

“To God be the glory.”

God is always at work. I affirm this with all of my heart. I believe God is still working in my life and the feeling is surreal as I think about this post. Some of these thoughts aren’t really new to some of you. I’ve shared in previous posts these reflections.

This post is unique.

A very long time ago I wondered upon the campus of a church that I’ve come to love very much. It’s my home away from home. I’ve always loved this church. It’s composed of people who’ve become some of our dearest friends.

There are people in this church who have no clue and don’t even realize how much of an impact they’ve made on my life for Christ. I am a follower of Jesus, husband, father, and pastor because of how some of these people were used in my life by Christ.

When I was a Jr. High kid there were two places I could be found.

The boulevard or at church.

This past Wednesday I had an experience that was so surreal that I felt I was in a scene out of the matrix. It happened again on Friday and even on Saturday morning.

I dropped my kids off with some friends of theirs at this church for a youth group function.  At this church there is a room where the youth function took place. This room always takes me back to my life as a kiddoe.

This room was where I learned from folks that I was loved and valued by Christ.

It was a room where I learned how to play guitar and lead worship. It was a room where I earned a Holy Land coin from my 7th grade Sunday school teacher if I memorized scripture. It was a room where I heard good news as a youth that Jesus loved me and would be faithful in the midst of the joys and struggles of life. It was even the room where I served with my wife in ministry prior to us getting married, helping her run an after school children’s program for the neighborhood.

This week our two boys got introduced to this room. They were introduced to people who continue the vision of loving kids and giving Jesus to them by showing them simple acts of kindness. Seeds of faith planted into their hearts.

As I drove off after dropping them off, I couldn’t help but remember the emptiness I had as a kid not having parents who were available and who showed up as parents. As I drove off I was overwhelmed with God’s blessing that although I didn’t have my parents, that I had the church, the kingdom of God here on earth filing that hole in my heart. As I drove off I was tickled pink that my wife and I get to be parents of some awesome gifts from upon high. As I drove off, I felt grateful that the Lord of the universe, through the work of the church, saved my life. And as I drove off I was overwhelmed with joy that the seeds of faith that were planted in my heart as a youth, were being planted and rooted in the hearts of our kids. Seeds of faith that I took from people who loved me and that we gave and still give and will give to our kids as parents.

And it all began in that room in 1982.

Surreal.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3p_sYIS6C0]

A recent bowling trip with the youth at our church…